Freelancer payment besides a full time job

hamopipa

Jul 13, 2017

5

Question

Hi All,

I have a full-time job and I am non-EU but resident in Brussels for 4 years. Recently I received an offer to work besides my full-time job during weekends on an IT project as a freelancer. The company I am working as a freelancer is based in Germany. During 2017 I should earn more than 12k EUR from this freelancer activity. Now I am supposed to invoice the German company. Do I need to add on the invoice the German 19% tax (MwsT). How should I declare this income in Belgium. Do I need to register somewhere.

Thanks in advance!
hamo

socrate

As far as I know, if your work is based in Belgium you do not charge VAT if sending an invoice outside of Belgium, and you add a statement to the effect to that, but you need to look up the appropriate statement, which includes a reference to the law article.

Jul 13, 2017 02:29

CC_R

Normally if self employed here there are companies which can help with the paper work and take the correct payments out for you, but I think you would be better off talking to an accountant to ensure you declare this legally and pay tax on it somewhere either at source if applicable or locally but you will need professional help for s complex tax situation like this is my guess

Jul 13, 2017 08:51

xl

Get an accountant TODAY and DON'T DO ANYTHING BEFORE (e.g. invoicing) you sorted out your matters. It's more complicated than it looks re to an annual earning of +12k for 2017 --- this is not a small side job anymore.
Yes, you have to register, to declare to your mutualité (it will heighten your social security payments) and to declare every single cent to the Belgian tax authorities.
Your accountant will explain and work it out with you.
and sorry, all of these should have been sorted out before you started working for this side job company. Good luck, xl

Jul 13, 2017 09:12

J

You have several options.

One is an "independent complimentaire" - you register as a "part" freelancer. You can then invoice the German company directly. You are likely to need an accountant for this, and you'll have to pay social security.

Another is to go through a company like http://smartbe.be/en/
They issue invoices to the German company, and you get paid as an employee. As they have English speaking advisors, I'd start with that.

Jul 13, 2017 11:11

umerali

This is great to see that you are already making a good money on doing freelance projects but I think you should charge a little bit more for this gig as you have already worked upon their project for more than 1 year. I have worked freelance for a leading SEO company in Pakistan for their online designing and branding projects such as infographics, banners etc. And as they are satisfied with my work, I used to ask more for the increase in the tasks and errands. So, you should try this too. thanks